I do not know where Gould fitted on that scale. I suspect he was in different places at different times.
OTOH, offhand I am not sure what is so “immoral” about #4, per se. Don’t lots of people going into the hard sciences want to improve society, such as medical researchers? Certainly it is not surprising that people will think that what improves society is what agrees with their own ideology, even if perhaps you disapprove of their ideology. I think the potential problem here is the main topic of this blog: when people lie about or distort actual scientific findings or research in order to fit in with some ideological agenda. Certainly people have charged Gould with being motivated for parts of his research by his ideology. However, I am not aware of anybody successfully claiming that he actually distorted or lied about findings in the process of doing so. If not, then the charge of “immorality” is way overblown, just like most of Eliezer’s charges against him, drawn from sources who were his worst enemies and strongest opponents.
Douglas Knight,
Not sure without further discussion what my “non sequitors” were, but your statement about Gould as a (non) theorist is amazingly empty. How is that you say hs is not an important theorist? While some have labeled it as “just relabeling,” or something like that, I have yet to see anybody here offer up even one, much less ten, new ideas in evolutionary theory more important than Gould’s of punctuated equilibrium.
I will offer one: coevolution, due to Paul Ehrlich. However, even more than punctuated equilibrium, this is one that one can find strong precursors of in Darwin, big time.
Ian Nowland,
I do not know where Gould fitted on that scale. I suspect he was in different places at different times.
OTOH, offhand I am not sure what is so “immoral” about #4, per se. Don’t lots of people going into the hard sciences want to improve society, such as medical researchers? Certainly it is not surprising that people will think that what improves society is what agrees with their own ideology, even if perhaps you disapprove of their ideology. I think the potential problem here is the main topic of this blog: when people lie about or distort actual scientific findings or research in order to fit in with some ideological agenda. Certainly people have charged Gould with being motivated for parts of his research by his ideology. However, I am not aware of anybody successfully claiming that he actually distorted or lied about findings in the process of doing so. If not, then the charge of “immorality” is way overblown, just like most of Eliezer’s charges against him, drawn from sources who were his worst enemies and strongest opponents.
Douglas Knight,
Not sure without further discussion what my “non sequitors” were, but your statement about Gould as a (non) theorist is amazingly empty. How is that you say hs is not an important theorist? While some have labeled it as “just relabeling,” or something like that, I have yet to see anybody here offer up even one, much less ten, new ideas in evolutionary theory more important than Gould’s of punctuated equilibrium.
I will offer one: coevolution, due to Paul Ehrlich. However, even more than punctuated equilibrium, this is one that one can find strong precursors of in Darwin, big time.